A single company will operate the bus network across central Adelaide after Torrens Transit acquired the company that runs services to the inner northern and southern suburbs, as well as O-Bahn buses.

About 700 employees and more than 370 buses are to be drawn under the Torrens Transit banner by the middle of the year after the Australian company signed a contract to acquire Light City Buses from Broadspectrum (formerly known as Transfield Services).

LCB has been servicing the Inner North, Inner South and Outer North East contract regions of Adelaide since Torrens Transit offloaded the areas in 2011.

Now that Torrens Transit has taken them back, the only other remaining Adelaide Metro bus service operator is SouthLink, which runs the Outer North, Outer South and Hills areas.

Clint Feuerherdt, CEO of Transit Systems Group which owns Torrens Transit, told InDaily there would be no change to bus timetables or routes for now but the company intended to propose new services to link north-south and east-west routes.

Fueurherdt said the acquisition opened the possibility of more seamless routes.

“It breaks down the barriers between the contract regions,” he said.

“We have a successful history of performance in Adelaide.

Torrens Transit will now take over the North South contract area.

“We are looking forward to bringing world’s best practice to even more Adelaide commuters … we are excited to work with the South Australian Government to deliver improved services for the Adelaide community and ensure the moving public can get on with their day in the most time efficient manner possible.”

Torrens Transit’s contract is set to be reviewed mid-next year for the period until 2023.

SouthLink is owned by a French and Australian joint venture.

“Uber for buses”

The company last year acquired a demand-sensitive “Uber for buses” platform, BRIDJ, which it says may be rolled out to Adelaide in future.

BRIDJ allows users to plug their destination into an app and connect with other nearby users going to the same place.

The commuters congregate to be picked up at a “virtual bus stop” no more than five minutes walk from their location, and the bus routes are chosen in real time to avoid traffic jams.

Torrens Transit has a contract to roll out the service in Sydney and believes the option would work in Adelaide.

“It’s like the Uber for public transport,” said Feuerherdt.

“We’re in the process of rolling that out in Sydney.

“It’s a logical extension for us to introduce that into Adelaide at some point.”

I think the major problem was that Light City Buses tendered too low a price to obtain the contracts.The contract became unprofitable and LCB couldn;'t offer a completely quality service.Along the same lines as Transdev in Melbourne-although the quality of their operation is worse.

this is good news.i am hoping these changes mean a reinstatement of the elizabeth to glenelg j1 or j2 which was greenwith to harbourtown shame it's not till 2019 so for this year i have to put up with one more year of limos to the airport and my mom(providing she has not had any alcohol that day)picking me up when i return home.so the university misses out under my idea.what's a small walk to get a m44 or a 141/142/h30/h33/h20/h22 and change services that way for younger people from currie st.

just be thankful it didn't return to serco.reliability of them ranks up there with parent pick up's for their kids when it comes to punctuality.i had the misfortune of having to use them a lot back on p plates due to my father being too stingy to go new car shopping straight away forcing me to accept my brother hand me down or nothing which i refused.i am so peeved to this day.his reliability was as bad with me as serco if not worse.

Last edited by homer9000 on Sat Jun 02, 2018 10:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

Speaking of the cross town 100/300 routes, I think there should be alternatives to just the current 300G, 300M etc, but suggesting them here is like talking to a wall in regards to the likelihood of it being implemented. Nonetheless, I was thinking that instead of just having several variants of 300, why not rename them 301, 302 etc to various destinations. It would also allow for some flexibility, such as deviating from the current 300 route for whatever reason

It would be logical to rename the current C1 to J1, but I heard somewhere that the current operations will remain separate from each other as though they were two different contract areas. So it's unlikely that the system will revert to what it was before LCB entered the scene.

The CEO of TSA has already stated that they would be working with the Government to improve services, frequencies and integrating services ,so nothing at this stage is out of the question.It depends on DPTI or the new SAPTA to work collaboratively with Torrens Transit.

CEO of Transit Systems Australia which owns Torrens Transit has commented that 2 services which could return to the O-Bahn track if there is sufficient demand and it gets Government approval.CEO Clint Feuerherdt stated that both the H30 from West Lakes to Paradise Interchange and the 178 from Athelstone to Paradise could be back on the track by the end of the year. Both previously ran on the track until 2011 when Torrens Transit lost the O-Bahn contract to LCB.

Last edited by jibb on Wed May 30, 2018 11:06 pm, edited 1 time in total.

H30 & 178 have never run on the O-Bahn. These services through-linked with former O-Bahn routes 530 & 578 (and 530X & 578X) respectively.

Would be interesting to see if there are enough spare O-Bahn buses to make this happen, and if contract areas will be allowed to mix again if they might be broken up again in the future, especially seeing as the contracts may change again next year.

$2,500 fines for vehicles illegally using red Bus Only lanes - could cut the state's debt real quickly if they extended that to regular Bus Lanes!

Eagle Eye wrote:H30 & 178 have never run on the O-Bahn. These services through-linked with former O-Bahn routes 530 & 578 (and 530X & 578X) respectively.

Would be interesting to see if there are enough spare O-Bahn buses to make this happen, and if contract areas will be allowed to mix again if they might be broken up again in the future, especially seeing as the contracts may change again next year.

Seeing as it is one company it shouldn't be a problem, providing the Government approves, and I am certain Clint wouldn't be talking about this idea unless he feels confident in it being approved.It might help if this happens to have some O-Bahn buses based at Newton as St Agnes is full at night. Torrens Transit has plenty of buses that could be converted for O-Bahn use if they are needed, including some Artics.Might also be an opportunity to resurrect the J1/J2 services from Elizabeth /Greenwith to the City via the O-Bahn, then onto the Airport, Harbour Town and Glenelg.

Eagle Eye wrote:H30 & 178 have never run on the O-Bahn. These services through-linked with former O-Bahn routes 530 & 578 (and 530X & 578X) respectively.

Would be interesting to see if there are enough spare O-Bahn buses to make this happen, and if contract areas will be allowed to mix again if they might be broken up again in the future, especially seeing as the contracts may change again next year.

530? I don’t remember a 530 running on the O-Bahn close enough to a 530 would of been the T530 that was - City to Elizabeth Station.

Do you mean route 504 Eagle Eye? one of those Torrens routes that went from the city along the O-Bahn to Paradise then returning to city as a 104?

a return to the old days would be nice 576/577 for Athelstone and Run the existing H30 as far as the Newton shopping mall on Montacute Rd but no further.whats a small walk to Graves St for an o bahn to the city or feeder to paradise to connect onwards to any c1/c2/m44/g40/502 anyway during daylight hours or on weekends.